


Giftfic 4

by Dreadmartha



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, Sad queeny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-02
Updated: 2012-01-02
Packaged: 2017-10-28 18:32:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/310892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dreadmartha/pseuds/Dreadmartha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fic written around / inspired by Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Giftfic 4

The empty spot in front of you in the bed is torturing you. Your husband lays behind you, cuddled up nice and lovingly.

He’s got an arm around you and his brow on the shoulder you’re sleeping on. You can feel his breath move down your back. You’ve always loved when he did that. You’ve always loved him.

And that’s the problem.

The empty space is where someone should lay down, one hand on your throat, eyes full of the most potent hate one can feel. You should wake up in the middle of the night to find them glaring at you.

You love being loved, but you don’t enjoy it as much as you could. How is a queen to know the love of her king when she has no hate to compare it against?

——

You’ve always liked the way your dress sweeps along the streets of Derse, your long, colorful trail moving over the purple brick road. It is, like everything you wear these days, made from rationed cloth. It reminds you of the smoothness of your rule so far, managing to keep your kingdom together in the face of a war with Prospit. The last thing your husband needed was for his people to turn against him, when victory is so uncertain.

It’s been your duty to keep the people of Derse together during these hard times, and you’ve done things previous queens never did. You move through the streets of the capital with only three guards, talk freely with the commoners. You’ve taken steps to keep women and boys under the age of thirteen out of conscription lists.

When your husband makes an address, the people chant their obligatory ‘long live the king,’ but on the handful of times you’ve spoken publicly they cheer ‘long live the queen!’

That’s never happened before, in all of Derse’s history.

You try not to let it go to your head. They’re only cheering because you’re the barer of good news, it is the king’s job to announce that you are going to war with Prospit.

The night he made that speech you held him there in the dark of the royal bedroom and felt him shaking all night.

——

You don’t like being confined to the castle, but the threat of an assassination attempt is enough reason to keep you home. For the first months of the war you moved about the capital as usual, but the war has tilted towards Derse’s favor, which has made the Prospitians fight more viciously. Reports come back of whole Derse troops being slaughtered by small bands of white soldiers. A war of attrition, they call it. You call it a monstrosity.

Your husband is distant. What you know of the war you hear largely from the aids of generals and adviser. Despite being the people’s queen you aren’t expected to talk about the war with those in charge of it.

You don’t fuss. All you know is that you are against the war, you are against anything that leads to the destruction of so many of your citizens. You’re against anything that turns your husband to stone. You’re against anything that leaves you so far removed from the streets of the capital. You’re against anything that leaves you hating someone in such a vague manner.

You need an outlet for your anger, and when you look around you only see people who need your love. It’s very frustrating.

——

You don’t like having to wear rationed clothing, but you won’t stand for the sons and husbands of Derse going into battle without uniforms.

It’s royal decree that cloth be rationed, which has led to the somewhat tasteless fashion of these times. You made a point of wearing rationed designs before the war, in an effort to take the inherent shame out of it. Now that it is a law, you can settle back and understand how little you like it.

Before now it would have been unseemly.

What is more unseemly, however, is someone refusing to follow royal orders.

——

The war has turned to Prospit’s favor and you see now how weak your empire is. It’s as if the castle were built on pillars of sand, waiting for the wave that would destroy them and send you, your king and all of Derse’s hope into a maelstrom.

What’s more, you know that now the war of attrition is being fought by the sons and husbands of Derse.

You need an outlet, and Jack Noir has started to get on your fragile, war-time nerves.

——

There are reports of a revolution in Prospit. It’s good news, but you can’t help wondering if there is one in the streets of Derse. You’ve been shut up in this castle for so long.

Noir is no help at all. He wants your head on a plate. You’ve never hated anyone so much.

He is a pain, and your husband is a great relief. You’ve never loved him more.

——

The revolution in Prospit was put down. The war goes on.

This war will destroy both Prospit and Derse, you know. You don’t say anything to your husband, you only hold him and kiss him after you’ve lured him out of his melancholic mood.

You’ve told Noir that the war will kill him, that you’ve put his name at the top of the conscription lists. But the knowledge that it will take everyone, that it is the wave that will drown Derse, that you keep to yourself.

——

Time passes. Schemes are hatched, spread their wings and come crashing down. You and your beloved husband fall. Somewhere in time you lose him. All you have left is Noir. He destroyed your kingdom, he brought revolutionaries to your door and exiled you to the desert.

He killed your king. And you’re never going to forget that.

You live a life dedicated to killing him. That is all you need.


End file.
